A Double Couple

Ash has received his final letter and has been reunited with his old Pokemon Pidgeot, Butterfree and Primeape. Along with Brock and Pikachu, they are headed to route 25 to figure out what the letter is asking.

"Ah Saffron City, just up through route 5 and then we will almost be there, say Ash is there a time stamp on the letter?" Brock asks taking in a deep breath in, "A timestamp?" Ash responds confused, "Really Ash? You know, a timestamp, does the letter say you have to finish it by a certain time?" Brock laughs, "Oh, uhh let me check" Ash pulls the letter out and examines every inch of it. "Not that I can see Brock, it just the instructions and that's it" Brock looks concerned, "why would it have one?" Ash asks, "Well, if you think of this letter and that Anthony received your final letter a year ago surely it's leading up to something big it would just make a lot more sense if there was a time period," Brock tells Ash, "I mean that would make sense, but why would you say that! Now I'm scared I won't finish in time" Ash panics and runs off, "Come on Pikachu, Brock hurry up off the route 25!" Pikachu chasing Ash but not for long, Ash is interrupted by a crowd of people surrounding a Pokemon battle. "Pikachu" Ash turns his head to his friend, "a Pokemon battle! Let's check it out buddy," Ash and Pikachu run towards the crowd of people, "he has the attention spanned of a six-year-old," Brock says to himself as he walks over to the crowd.

"Meowth come on pass the sandwiches over here," James whinges, "Stop being a hog Meowth" Jessie yells and snatches the Sandwiches from Meowth's hands, "A Meowth has to eat you know," Meowth says antagonising his friends, "eat on this then" Jessie shoves the black and white sandwich wrapper in Meowth's mouth" "You know treating a Pokemon like that isn't very nice," a voice come from the bushes, "Meowth how did you get your voice so high?" James asks confused, "Yeah, and you have a mouth full of plastic that's pretty impressive," Jessie turns around to see Meowth shrugging his shoulder indicating it wasn't him, "all right whose there? Jessie stands up and shouts out, James looks around confused taking his eyes off the sandwiches, a grey paw comes in and snatches the sandwiches without being seen, "mgmenr msdgnreg" Meowth mumbles, "would you be quiet Meowth!" Jessie yells, "AHH!" James yells out getting Jessie's attention, "What is it? AHH! The sandwiches are gone!" Jessie shouts out, the grey paw reappears but this time grabbing Meowth and taking him into the bushes, "Meowth, you pig, you ate all the sandwiches!" James turns around in anger, "Wheres Meowth?" James says quietly, "Are you serious!" Jessie yells, that little pig took the sandwiches and ran off, come on let's go find him, James!" Jessie grabs James by the shoulder and drags him off into the opposite direction Meowth got taken.

Ash and Pikachu manage to squeeze their way into the crowd and make it to the front where they see a double battle going on, "Marowak bone rush on Dodrio" "Sceptile protect Marowak and hit Rapidash with leaf blade" Marowak and Sceptile's trainers call out their orders on their injured opponents, "Rapidash dodge it!" "Dodrio jump out of the way!" Rapidash and Dodrio's trainers scream out hoping their Pokemon can dodge but its too late, Sceptile runs in with Marowak behind and hits a direct hit on Rapidash's throat sending it to the ground and knocking it out, Marowak jumps up at throws its bone spinning towards Dodrio, another direct hit sending Dodrio into the knocked out Rapidash, "Dodrio and Rapidash are unable to battle their fore the winners are Marowak and Sceptile, Gisselle and Joe have won the battle, sending this years World ranking to 5034" the Rotom-bot calls out. "We did it Marowak!" Gisselle runs in and gives her Pokemon a hug, "Awesome job Sceptile" Joe runs in and jumps on his Sceptile, "Dodrio return, you did great" a hand appears on Dodrio's trainer, "don't worry Dario, we'll get the next one," Dario looks up at his teammate and smiles, "thanks Lara" Lara smiles back and returns her Rapidash.

The crowd start to disperse, Ash and Pikachu run-up to Joe and Gisselle, "Ash, it's been a while," Joe calls out, Ash looks at his old friend, Joe is wearing a blue jacket with the Pokemon Prep logo on the left chest, a red tie covers his white t-shirt, his black polished belt stands out as his blue clean-cut pants come down to cover the top of his black loafers, Ash smiles as he looks Joe in the eyes and sees he still has the baby innocent look, his brown hair in a bowl cut and saddened blue eyes gets your attention. "What are you doing back in Saffron City Ash?" Gisselle asks walking next to Joe, Ash turns his head to Gisselle who has long dark brown hair that comes down just below her knees, a puffy white jacket covers her shoulders with an ocean vest and red bow covering the rest of her upper body, her ocean coloured skirt just comes up halfway up her thigh with her legs from the knees down being covered by long white socks that go into her polished black flats. "I saw your battle, you guys looked so strong," Ash says admiring his old friends, "thank you, Ash," Joe replies with a smile, "Ash!" a voice gets Ash's attention behind him, it's Dario and Lara walking up to him with Brock beside them. Dario with his wine-coloured hair in a ponytail is wearing a green colour V cut shirt and a red satchel over his left shoulder, his dirt-covered pale white pants connect to his pale brown gumboot like shoes. "That was a good battle you two" Lara calls out congratulating Joe and Gisselle, Lara wearing an orange headband covering her blue ponytail hair, her green V cut collar shirt is tucked into her blue short shorts and brown boot-like shoes covering her feet. "So Ash" Gisselle comes and brushes up against him, "what have you been up too? I saw you in Alolha, Champ" Gisselle flirting with Ash as Brock looks on a little confused and Joe getting angry as he watches his crush flirting with another boy, "Well Gisselle" Ash replies taking a step back from the flirting girl, "you see, I've been following these letters," "No way!" Lara steps forward and pulls out a letter.

"Hey get your dirty paws off of me!" Meowth shouts out, pushing the grey paw off of him, "What's the big deal grabbing me and stealing our sandwiches?" "I thought they where shoving plastic down your throat" Meowth brushes himself off and looks up, "they weren't those two idiots are my fri…" Meowth's face turns pale with a shock expression coming over, "did did did you just talk?" Meowth stutters, "yeah, you can talk to," the soothing light pitched voice replies, "bbbb but your a Pokemon, and not jjjjjust a Pokemon" Meowth stumbling across his words, the other Pokemon reaches her grey paw out and touches Meowth's Charm on his forehead, Meowth caught off guard by the beauty of the Pokemon standing in front of him, "your charm is very bright and golden, my charm is ruby," The Pokemon says, "you're an Alolan Meowth," Meowth says gobsmacked, the alolan Meowth pulls her paw back and smiles "that's me, but I go by the name Ruby or if you're more fancy Ruby the Alolan Meowth" Ruby replies with a chirpy tone, "how did you get to Kanto? and how can you talk!" Meowth in a surprised tone, "Well how can you talk?" Ruby asks, "I spent years watching and learning, I put my blood, sweat and tears into it and lost the ability payday in the process," Meowth tells Ruby, "interesting" Ruby replies putting her bright sparkling grey paw on her chin, "you see I obtained the ability to talk in a different way, I was brought here by a trainer, a man, he did all these experiments on me, that's why my charm is ruby, not golden, anyway eventually one of the experiments gave me the ability to talk and once they happened he stopped the experiments for a while.�� "That sounds awful," Meowth sits down on a nearby log with Ruby sitting next to him, "it wasn't that bad, the experiments didn't hurt and once he told me why he was doing them I decided to try and help him" Ruby replies looking up at the Pidgey sitting in the trees, "what reason can a human have to experiment on a Pokemon?" Meowth looking at Ruby with admiration, "it turned out that he used to have a wife that would help him with experiments to understand Pokemon better, to understand a Pokemon's mind using their DNA so they don't harm the Pokemon, one day an experiment went wrong and his wife turned into a Pokemon, the man tried to turn her back but wasn't able to and the wife ran away, his being trying to find a way ever since," Meowth looks at Ruby hanging on every word, "so why are you out here? Are you still with the man?" Ruby looks down to the ground, "No, about two years ago, he was called to go to work for a man named Giovanni," "WHAT!" Meowth stands up shocked.

"You guys have letters too?" Brock asks surprised, "Yeah we do too," Joe tells them pulling out a letter, "Gisselle, Dario do you guys have any?" Ash asks, "My letter is actually our letter Ash," Joe tells Ash who turns to him interested, "yeah same as ours" Lara adding into the conversation. Brock looks confused at the letters, "What do your letters say?" Gisselle grabs the letter out of Joe's hand and brushes up against Ash again causing Joe to get jealous, "One must always prepare for war but never seek it out that is what strong leaders do, but what if these two sides combined would one prevail over the other or will they create something magnificent, go to Saffron City and seek out the battle of the doubles" Gisselle looks up to see everyone looking at her, she gets embarrassed, "ok, so what does the other letter say" she says out loud in a high pitched voice, Dario and Lara look at their letter, "our says the same thing except for the ending our says prepare for the battle of the doubles" Lara says. "Interesting, so from the letters you two seek out war and you two prepare for war," Brock says trying to understand the letters, "but the letters also say that what if these two sides combined not fight each other" Lara adding more confusion. "We've been here for two days now and nothing has changed" Gisselle moans leaning on Ash, Joe getting extremely jealous lets his emotions get the better of him and grabs Ash by the arm and pulls him away viciously from Gisselle, still giving him the stink eye, he sees that everyone is looking at him, Joe quick-thinking lets go of Ash and ask "will you help us work this out, Ash?" Ash turns too Brock who is looking at both of the letters side by side and not paying attention to anything else, "Yeah I will," "really!" Dario shouts, "Why not, I bet if we put our heads together we can work this out," the others look at him, smile and nod their heads in agreement, "what should we do first Brock?" Ash asking, getting the attention off of him, "Looking at these letters it is telling us that Joe and Gisselle need to seek out a battle of some kind and Dario and Lara need to work or prepare if you must through it," Brock explaining his hypothesis, "ok I think I know where we must go follow me," Joe shouts out walking off waving for the others to follow.

"Where is Meowth?" Jessie says frustrated, "If I ate all those sandwiches I'd be quite tired so his probably taking a nap under a tree or something," James tells Jessie, "all right so if you were going to have a nap where'd you go," Jessie looking over the bush's trying to find a shady spot, "over there" James shooting up pointing to a tree. Jessie and James tiptoe over to the tree, as they approach it they hear voices coming from behind the bush, "get down," Jessie falls to the ground dragging James down with her, smashing his face into the ground, "ow" James says in pain, "oh quit being a baby," Jessie tells James "I can hear Meowth's voice and a girls voice someones with him, James pulls his face up from the ground and wiggles his way with Jessie towards the bush. "You know Giovanni!" Meowth shouts out, Ruby looks at him confused, "No, I have no idea who this Giovanni is" "but you just said the man works for Giovanni," Meowth still surprised, "yeah he does but I never met him" Ruby replies, "So what happened when the man was called?" Meowth calming down, "Well he got called up and asked me to watch the house while he was away, I agreed I would. About six months past then the phone rang, I didn't know how to answer the phone so I let it go to voice mail, it was the man and he was in a panic, I remember he whispered loud, quick Ruby get out of the house some dangerous men are coming for you quickly run, when he said that I grab a handful of food when I heard the door getting smashed open so I jumped out of the kitchen window and ran for it, I've been living in the wild ever since." Ruby looking upset with a tear falling down her cheek, Meowth sits back down next to her and comforts her by wrapping his arms around her and pulling her head into his chest, "It sounds like Team Rocket, Giovanni is the leader and that man must have been a Team Rocket scientist," Ruby pulls her head away from Meowth and looks up at him, "whats Team Rocket?" Meowth looks away and pulls his hands in towards him, "What's wrong?" Ruby asks, "You still haven't answered me, why did you grab me before?" Meowth asks changing the subject, "I thought those people where the same ones who tried to take me because you can talk so I decided to save you," Ruby tells Meowth who looks back at her, "no, you see those two humans are actually my good friends," Ruby looks confused, "I saw them stuffing plastic down your throat and Rocket starts with R and they had big red R's on their clothes, doesn't that mean they are from Team Rocket?" Ruby stands up putting the pieces together, "So you're from Team Rocket!" Meowth stands up and tries to comfort her but Ruby pushes him away, "It's not like that Ruby," "then what is it like!" Ruby getting louder, "There are bad people that hurt Pokemon we only capture strong Pokemon we don't hurt them" Meowth trying to calm down Ruby, "you experiment on Pokemon you are evil people!" Ruby shouts out. "We are not evil!" Jessie shooting up from behind the bush scaring Ruby and Meowth, "Yeah, we would never hurt a Pokemon on purpose!" James shooting up next to her, Ruby scared and anxious runs away, "Ruby wait!" Meowth shouts out, "What are you doing Meowth," Jessie asks with an arrogant tone, Meowth turns to Jessie and James with anger, "why would you guys scare her like that!" Jessie and James scared a little at the angry Meowth, "I have never met another talking Meowth and you just scared her off!" James is about to open his mouth but his attention is grabbed by voices coming from the distance, Jessie and James hide behind the bush and grab Meowth, "where are you going" James whispers as Meowth starts walking away, "I'm going to go find Ruby" Meowth replies annoyed, "get back here Meowth" Jessie whispers grabbing Meowth and placing him next to her, "She was never going to trust you after she found out you where apart of Team Rocket" Meowth looks at Jessie who is peeking over the bush to see whose coming, James taps Meowth on the shoulder, "look Meowth, we are apart of Team Rocket they do a lot of bad things that we don't agree on but they brought us three together and we've been through a lot together, we owe Team Rocket a lot so we stand by them, Ruby will never understand that you need to let it go," Meowth's eyes water up, he covers them with his paw trying to cover his tears, James puts his hand on Meowth's head and pats him, "I know what finding someone else like you means Meowth but if they don't accept you for you what's the point," Meowth looks at James who is smiling at him, "you have us after all, far out no need to get all weepy," Jessie adds in. Meowth looks at his two friends and nods his head, "It's the twerps!" Jessie whispers loudly, "Pikachu is there as well," James adds, "let's capture Pikachu" Meowth putting his paw in a fist.

"So where are we Joe, Gisselle do you know?" Lara calls out, "I don't know I just had this feeling that this is where we needed to be," Joe tells them, "well nothing is here" Dario looking around, Ash and Brock look at each other confused on what to do, then a robot arm comes out from the bush and grabs Pikachu, "Pikachu!" Ash shouts out, they all turn around to see Team Rocket appear from the bush with Pikachu in steel cage. "Prepare for trouble" Jessie starting the motto, "Marowak come out and break the cage holding Pikachu!" Gisselle lets out Marowak who throws its bone, breaking the steel cage holding Pikachu, Pikachu jumps out and runs towards Ash, Team Rocket shocked at what just happened "Are you serious! Two times in a row!" Jessie shouts out throwing a tantrum, "You need to let us finish our introduction!" James shouts. "Pikachu get ready," Ash calls out, "wait Ash" Lara and Dario step forward, "this fight is for the four of us," Gisselle tells Ash, stepping forward with Joe, "Sceptile, Rapidash, Dodrio come out!" The three of them let out there Pokemon. "Marowak bone rush on Meowth go!" Marowak throws his bone hurling towards Meowth, but James steps in front of Meowth getting hit instead, Meowth looks at his friend who has fallen on the ground, "Sceptile razor leaf go" Joe calls out. Sceptile unleashes a swarm of razor-sharp leaves towards Meowth, Jessie jumps in front getting hit by the razor leaf, 'Jessie, James you guys" Meowth tearing up, "I've got this!" Meowth runs in towards Marowak and hits fury swipes hurting Marowak, "Marowak!" Gisselle shouts out. "Sceptile leaf blade" Joe shouts out, Sceptile runs at Meowth but Meowth jumps up and dodges landing on Sceptile's head kicking him into the ground, "Rapidash, flamethrower" Lara calls out calmly, Rapidash unleashes a bursting flame heading towards Meowth and is about to hit him but Ruby jumps out from the tree and tackles Meowth out of the way. Meowth looks up at Ruby shocked, "You came back?" "I saw what those two humans did for you, stepping in front of those attacks so you wouldn't get hurt, I guess you were right about them," Ruby says as she helps Meowth up, "let's fight them together" Ruby putting her hand out to meet Meowth's hand. Meowth looks at her lovingly but snaps out of it and shakes her hand, "Let's do this!" he says.

"Meowth I'll take left you take right go" Ruby runs in and hits shadow claw on Marowak knocking it out, Meowth runs in about to hit Sceptile but Dodrio hits wild charge sending Meowth flying back into Jessie and James, "Meowth!" Ruby shouts out, "You're going to pay for that!" Ruby turns to face Dodrio and hits night slash sending Dodrio into Sceptile, Lara looks at Dario and whispers to him "we need to get them together so we can launch one strong attack, Joe and Gisselle you two distract them while Dario and I attack." The others nod their head in agreement, "Sceptile, run at Meowth and hit razor blade at its feet" Joe calls out, "Marowak, get up and just stand over there make sure Meowth can't escape," Gisselle calls out as Marowak regains consciousness, Sceptile runs at Ruby and hits leaf blade at her feet causing her to jump straight up with Marowak blocking her from running into the trees, "Rapidash, Dodrio mega kick go!" Lara and Dario shout out, the two Pokemon hit mega kick into Ruby whose still in the air sending her into Jessie, James and Meowth. "Ruby, are you ok?" Meowth asks as he grabs her paw, Ruby looks back at Meowth and smiles, "Now Rapidash, Dodrio, Marowak, Sceptile get rid of Team Rocket, flamethrower, leaf storm, bone rush, hyper beam!" The four trainers shout out their final attack as the Pokemon launch a series of powerful attacks at Team Rocket at once.

*boom

"We're blasting off again!" Jessie and James shout out, Meowth looks at Ruby and smiles, Ruby smiles back and grabs Meowth's paw, Team Rocket disappears with a star appearing after them. "Yes, we did it!" The four trainers congratulate each other, then out of the sky two letters fall in front of the two couples, Gisselle and Lara pick them up and open it, Gisselle and Joe read theirs, look up at Lara and Dario who are still reading theirs, "Ash, Brock nice to see you again we need to go bye" Gisselle and Joe say bye and run off in a hurry, "uhh, bye" Brock says confused, "what was that? What does your letter say, Lara, Dario?" Ash asks Lara and Dario look up at each other than at Ash and Brock, "Pikachu as cute as ever, Brock, Ash bye" Lara and Dario run off in a hurry as well, "uhh bye" Ash and Brock reply watching them run off into the distance, "So I guess we better get going then huh" Brock snapping Ash out of the confusion, "ahh yep off to route 25!" Ash shouts out as the three of them head off to Route 25.